SERMONIC CRITICISM AND SUGGESTION PLACE OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE PREACHING OF TO-DAY BY THE REV. JAMES M. CAMPBELL, LOMBARD, ILLINOIS. THE place which the doctrine of the Holy Spirit occupies in the present-day development of thought indicates the place which it ought to occupy in the preaching of to-day. 1. The preacher of to-day ought to take the presence of the Holy Spirit for granted. The presence of the Holy Spirit is the leading characteristic of the present dispensation. Browning said that he was very sure of God. That is more than can be said of many modern preachers. Even when they are sure of the Father and of the Son they are not so very sure of the Holy Spirit. He is the one uncertain factor. They plead with Him to come, they entreat the Father to send Him, they do everything but recognize His brooding presence, His unresting and unhasting activity. Prior to Pentecost the Lord enjoined His disciples to pray for the Spirit; but where is there the slightest intimation that they were ever enjoined to pray for the Spirit after Pentecost? Why should they pray for what had already been given? The pre-Pentecostal saints were told to tarry in Jerusalem until they were endued with power from on high. But we are not in Jerusalem, nor are we called upon to tarry. Words which had in them a prophetic element which has long since been fulfilled are not to be taken as if they applied to Christians of all times. When we read the words, "Ye shall receive power after that the Holy Spirit is come upon you,' it is surely pertinent to inquire when were these words spoken? Has the promise which they contain been fulfilled? The advent of the Spirit is here, as always, referred to as a distinct event. Has it taken place? Has the Spirit come upon the church? Need we answer? The Spirit is here, and here forever to abide. His presence is therefore to be always assumed. Instead of tarrying for His coming, we are to rejoice in His presence; instead of waiting for His enduement of power, we are to go to work believing that all the power we need has been made over to us; instead of waiting through weary years of deferred hope for Him to come and take possession of us, we are to yield ourselves at once to His influence, doing the work that He bids us in the strength that He gives us. Confirmatory of the position which we have taken, let it be noted that, while Jesus always speaks of the coming of the Spirit as future, the apostles speak of it as something which has actually transpired. Paul never exhorts Christians to pray for the Spirit; he exhorts them to be led by the Spirit, to walk in the Spirit, to live in the Spirit, to be filled with the Spirit. The Spirit's availability he never questions. The cooperation of the Spirit with those who ally themselves to Him is looked upon as no less certain than the operation of such natural forces as gravitation or electricity, upon the uniformity of whose laws we so confidently reckon. He will stay by the church as long as His help is needed; He will stay by every sin-wrecked soul until He sinks beneath the waves; He will stay by this world which the atoning blood of Calvary's Lamb has bought for God, until its redemption has been realized. 2. The preacher of to-day is to give prominence to the idea of the divine immanence as that idea is enshrined in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Rightly understood, the divine immanence means something more than a divine energy and life pervading the universe. It means also a divine Presence dwelling in a conscious human soul, filling it with joy unspeakable, and making it overflow with spiritual influence. The doctrine of the Holy Spirit represents the vital truth which lies at the heart of Pantheism; and Pantheism is the philosophic expression of the idea of the divine immanence. While correcting Pantheism of its most fatal error, by setting forth the personality of the divine Spirit, it sublimes the truth which Pantheism conserves by representing the Spirit's influence not only as moral,,but as redemptive. The Holy Spirit immanent in nature and in man is a redeeming Spirit, working ceaselessly for man's salvation. He stands for the divine universal in redemption. The work of the historical Christ is limited in its area; the work of the Holy Spirit-the Spirit of the risen, glorified Christ-is universal. It is as wide in the sweep of its saving influence as the devastations of human sin, and it is as potent as it is wide. It is a serious mistake to speak of the immanence of the Spirit as something less than universal, or to speak of His indwelling in the Christian heart as if it were a separate and distinct gift bestowed upon some and withheld from others. Monopoly has no place in the divine system. The Spirit is for all alike. The largest measure of His presence enjoyed by any is available for all. His fulness is always present, altho it may not be always received. A coral island is a mere ring of rock, the highest point of a stupendous mountain which rises from the bottom of the ocean. We see only what juts above water, but we know that the larger part is beneath. So with the Holy Spirit. What appears upon the surface is only a small part of what lies below the line of consciousness. Altho ever at work on our behalf we have but a dim perception of what He is doing. Even in those supreme moments when we are conscious of His presence we are compelled to say, "Lo, these are but the outskirts of his ways, and, how small a whisper do we hear of him? but the thunder of his power who can understand?" (Job xxxvi. 13, 14). It may be asked, If the Holy Spirit is a constant tenant of the believing soul, why is it that so many are unconscious of His presence? Why is it that the appeal has still to be made, "Know ye not that your body is a sanctuary of the Holy Spirit, which is in you, which ye have from God?" (1 Cor. vi. 19). As well ask, If the circumambient atmosphere touches every part of the body, why is its presence not always felt? We know that God is ever near, but how seldom do we feel the touch of His hand, how seldom have we a realizing sense of His nearness? We have to walk by faith, not by feeling. In the hour when we can not find Him we fall back upon the absolute fact of His presence. At the very time when darkness veils His face from us we believe that He is pressing us to His breast. And so we are to believe in the inhabitation of His Spirit, even altho there is nothing answering to it in our experience. We are to believe that He has taken up His abode within us even altho we have no consciousness of the fact. The fact itself is the important thing; the consciousness of the fact is a secondary matter. If we seize hold of the fact, the consciousness of it will come; if we seek the consciousness of the fact while we lose sight of the fact itself, the soul will remain in darkness and weakness, or be plunged into despair. 3. The modern preacher is to cultivate the habit of looking for the Spirit in the common experiences of life. The Spirit's operations, as a rule, can not be distinguished from the ordinary workings of the soul. It is only occasionally that they are recognized by their startling character. The Spirit works in natural ways. His influence, which is not mechanical but vital, is like that of one human spirit upon another, suasive, moral, and resistible. It is not something separate and apart from ordinary experience, but is fundamentally and essentially the same in all Christians. All are partakers of the one Spirit, and all are possessors of the one experience. It is true that in many Christian lives there occur sudden floodings of the soul with light and power; but in these cases nothing is received which was not already in some measure possessed and which is not in some degree the inheritance of every saint. There is an esoteric Buddhism, but there is no esoteric Christianity. A more active faith, a more complete self-surrender, will bring a larger inflow of spiritual life; but they can bring no better quality of life. They will bring a deepening of life; but they can not bring a deeper life. They will lead to higher living; but they can not give a higher life. The life of Christ, which the Spirit ministers, is the largest, the deepest, the highest life realizable, or even conceivable. When Jesus said that He would be in those who came to Him an overflowing fountain of spiritual life, the explanation is added, “This spake he of the Spirit which they that believed on him were to receive" (John vii. 39). This gift of life in the Spirit was to be for all believers, and not for an elect few. It was to be a universal Christian gift. In the Gospel proclamation, "Repent and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, unto the remission of your sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit" (Acts ii. 39), repentance, baptism, remission of sins, and the gift of the Holy Spirit synchronize. They belong to the same person at the same time. The question of Paul to the Galatians-"This would I learn of you, received ye the Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith?" (ch. iii. 2)-implies that they had received the Spirit at conversion; and now how it had come. they were simply admonished to remember There is no Christian who is destitute of the Spirit, and there is no Christian who has as much of the Spirit as he might have and ought to have. And we may add, there is no Christian of whom the Spirit has as much as he wants to have. The universal gift of the Spirit is given to each one in the form which is specially suited to him, the form which agrees with his nature, and with the work to which he has been providentially appointed. The supernatural and the natural blend. Natural capacity shapes the form and determines the size of the supernatural gift. To most the Spirit is given as an ordinary gift adapted to ordinary work. Early in my Christian life I wore out the knees of my trousers praying for a special baptism of power, which I expected to come as a divine afflatus which was to make me a fire-tongued evangelist. It did not come in that way, and I was sorely disappointed. I have long since come to see that my work was not that of an evangelist. The Lord had long years of very common work for me to do, as a plain pastor, and He gave me the kind of power that was needful to do it. The trouble with us, or rather the trouble the Lord has with us, is that we want to be something out of the common; we covet a spectacular experience; we long to shine as stars of the first magnitude; we desire the success which shows in the Year-Book and secures the ecclesiastical plums; we seek the Spirit's power in the spirit of Simon Magus; we seek it as an end rather than a means to an end; we seek it for self-glory rather than for the glory of God. There is nothing regarding which we require to admonish one another more earnestly than the necessity of serving the Lord in natural ways, accepting with grace and gratitude the humblest task which He assigns. The size of our work is a thing of no moment whatever. Not the work we do, but the way in which we do it determines our character. AN ENGLISHMAN'S PREACHING EXPERIENCE IN THE ROCKIES WHILE on a visit to Colorado to recover my health, I was glad to accept the pastoral care of a congregation in a mining town, situated amid the wildest scenes of the Rocky Mountains. I was not long there before finding that little interest was taken in sermons of the ordinary doctrinal or pastoral type. In this isolated place, with about one thousand inhabitants, there was, in a sense, a vigorous intellectual life; and no preacher could rouse an interest unless he entered with enthusiasm into its spirit. The leading citizens vied with one another in possessing good libraries, with well-bound editions of the standard novelists and many current works of fiction and popular philosophy. There was a Chautauqua circle and also a literary club, at which the ladies of the town were wont to read papers on topics like "My Favorite Lady Novelist"; and there was many a debate on the respective merits of Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte, George Eliot, and Mrs. Humphry Ward. Speculative interest in religion centered upon the psychological. The sermons which really interested people were those delivered on vital topics, such as "The Soul and its Powers," "Individuality and its Significance as a Social and Religious Factor." There was an inquiry, for instance, into the problems about the "subconscious self," and questions were asked as to whether the current discussions had really given any new proofs of immortality. The sermon of mine, I think, which interested people more than any other was one that I preached about the view that the soul is formed, in its enduring character, by a series of exquisite impressions from all life's surroundings received since infancy, which have left their memories of good and evil, of joys and sorrows, in a way permanently to influence the individual during a lifetime. I found, I may say, a uniform tendency to a common underlying belief among all who were in any way subject to cultured influences that man is born to a natural birthright of the divine; that the source of evil is seated in the obscurity or error which stunts growth and deprives man of his right to a full and harmonious development; and, while the doctrines of original sin, of justification, and of churchly grace might have been formally accepted, they were, in practise, subordinated to the positive belief that religions and churches are beneficial just in proportion as they help the development of man's natural goodness and enable him, in other words, to become his "true self." The basal idea of all the religion I found was just this idea of individuality, tho with it was closely associated the belief in social obligation and brotherhood. Individualism was associated with a sense of social duty, because it was generally thought that man really helps himself when he is of service to others. There was no need therefore for appealing to supernatural sanctions. It was only necessary to make man conscious of his inborn worth and dignity, and to show how these chiefly express themselves when man can prove his ability for service; and Christian doctrines were effective to the extent to which they can be shown to symbolize this ethical belief. These sentiments were illustrated in the interest taken in "union" services. In my experiences in the neighborhood I had more success with these services than with any others. In a neighboring mining camp, with a population of two hundred and fifty, I used to hold monthly services which were required to be undenominational, and the attendance averaged one hundred on each occasion, comprising almost the total of the church-going population. In another small settlement I opened the first religious service in a ranch, the first that had ever been held there, and it was attended by people of five denominations. Since I could not well get there on Sundays, and as the congregation could not gather together from a distance on week days, it was suggested that a union service be held every Sunday, in the school-house, to be conducted by the members of the congregation. These services were a great success; practically the whole adult population, about forty in number, used to attend, and the congregation included Methodists, Baptists, Catholics, Episcopalians, Adventists, Scientists, and Spiritualists, and some who did not belong to any denomination. The religious tenets held in common were the belief in a Deity as a positive principle of the good in the universe, tinged with a spiritualistic conception of another world, which was kept alive by private séances conducted in the neighborhood by a medium who was a leading member of the congregation. Here was a field where a pastor might have ministered to and helped to develop an existing very sincere and undenominational type of Christianity. Lower down in the same valley, and at the mountain end of one of the great cañons of Colorado, there was a summer resort, with a population of a class in religious sentiments more various than even that just mentioned. I had occasion subsequently to minister also to them. I found here some professed adherents to what may be called the "New Thought," which included various conceptions of "mind cure" and of optimistic theosophy. In two cases there was positive hostility to Christianity, joined with even an active propaganda undertaken to prove that it is an imperfect and incomplete religion. But, with thinking people who did not renounce Christianity, there was a decided trend toward esotericism. Questions relative to the Christian doctrines of the atonement and of sin and grace or churchmanship were unable to arouse the least degree of interest. But, as in the mining town, immediately the topic was broached about the powers of the soul or of the self-development which could be subjected to some tangible process of demonstration, there was no one who was not interested and who did not look forward to answers of the queries with tension and expectancy. The conclusion to be drawn from my experiences seems to me to be that if orthodox Christianity is to hold its own against Christian Science and the many kinds of "New Thought" (of which I found six or seven varieties in the one cañon which I have just mentioned), it must be presented as a series of positive and intelligible answers to the vital questions about life, individuality, and the possible development of mind, soul, and memory which interest everybody. The danger does not lie in the non-acceptance of Christian dogma; rather in its too easy acceptance as something which is taken for granted and then passed over as unrelated to life. To find how to make religious conceptions positive, it is not necessary to go outside the New Testament. There is a vital as well as an artificial way of approaching every great doctrine of the Christian faith. Thus the vital side of St. Paul's conception of religion lay in his faith that in each man was the power so to sacrifice his own individuality that a greater individuality, namely, Christ's, would, in the inevitable divine order of things, come and live in its place. This was a genuine and practical faith that man can pass into the "higher man "-the "over-man," as some have called it. In the apostle's mind all men might grow into the proportions of the perfect "measure." If that doctrine, especially applied to problems relating to psychology and human individuality, could be taught among the frank and unconventional people of the West, it should carry weight with it and check any tendency there may be to take out of the hands of Christian teachers the leadership of thought. A FAMOUS PICTURE AND ITS SERMON If you are in London you will find a picture in the Doré Gallery of Art, New Bond Street. It is entitled the "Vale of Tears." It was the master's last production, and he was fitted to be true to universal human nature by means of all the sorrow that seemed to compress itself into the last year or two of his own life. The dearest friends of home and club vanished out of his sight behind the horizon of death in those latter days. He was left alone, and felt with all the fine sense of his artistic, spiritual nature that touch of sorrow that makes a whole world kin. Then he sat down and reproduced that touch upon his canvas with such eloquent expression as has not been attained in color by any other painter or in words by any poet. Only Tennyson comes near it in the "Memoriam." In the center of a dreary, rocky, night-enshadowed land there opens a deep ravine. As if advancing toward the observer, downward along the rough, steep way, is the figure of the world's Christ. His eyes are tender with pitying love. On the left shoulder He bears a cross. His right hand is stretched forth in a beckoning, receiving attitude. Burning widely over His head is a resplendent circle of light, which casts a radiance over the whole dark scene. The "vale" is a rough, craggy Such is the cleft between the mountains. FREEMANTLE, WEST AUSTRALIA. being supported by friends and helpers, who The Sermon of the Picture Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. I. Earth's Needy Ones. 1. The laboring classes. These are hand |